Mooreavolcanic island, second largest of the Îles du Vent (Windward GroupIslands) of in the Society Islands , of French Polynesia, central South Pacific Ocean. The island, the remains of an ancient, half-eroded volcano, lies 12 miles (20 km) northwest of Tahiti. It has an area of 51 square miles (132 square km). It is triangular, rugged, and mountainous(, with many streams and fertile soils. Its highest peak is Mount Tohivea, at 3,960 feet [(1,207 m]), with many streams and fertile soilsmetres). The chief village, Afareaitu, lies on the east coast overlooked by Mount Muaputa (2,723 feet [830 mmetres]). Cook (Paopao) Bay and Opunohu (Papetoai(Oponu) Bay, divided by Mount Rotui, are on the north coast at the centre of what was once the volcano’s crater; Haapiti town is on the west. It was on Moorea, in the early 19th century, that the Reverend Henry Nott of the London Missionary Society, companion of King Pomare II, translated the Bible into Tahitian. The island’s chief crops are vanilla, copra, and coffee. Some The American writer Herman Melville traveled to the region in the 1840s, and some villages on the eastern coast were of Moorea became the models for the Tahitian villages in Herman Melville’s his novel Omoo (1847). The island island’s chief crops are vanilla, copra, and coffee. Moorea is now a favoured tourist location. Area 51 square miles (132 square km). Pop. (1988) 8,801; (2002) 14,550226.